Eisenberger Family of Five

Bless her heart, my amazing friend Carrie, dealt with my post pregnancy hormones during our family photos. All I wanted was the two oldest to look at her and smile....of course they're eight, six and all boy. I should know better than to get worked up....but I lost it....so I let go of the dream of having my very own Pinterest family photo shoot....

Note to parents - probably the best way to approach any photo shoot with your children in it, if you're able to, is to walk away and let the photographer do his/her thing rather than yell at your children behind the photographer to look at the gosh darn camera...that totally doesn't work...believe me, I know.

And yet, when I opened my gallery I was soooo happy with the final result - thankfully no signs of smeared mascara or flushed red cheeks...a couple funny out takes...and several photos of my awesome family of five...can't wait to get canvas prints on our walls!

Eisenberger - Family of Five

Pretty sure they're thinking...What the heck do we do with this???

My Grandma Shorty was an amazing quilter. Each Christmas meant new quilts for my cousins and I. She always had her sewing machine on the table working on someone's wedding, baby or anniversary gift. God bless her, she even tried to teach me to sew....we did create a couple projects worthy of bringing to the fair but more importantly, it meant I spent hours at my Grandma's kitchen table hearing her stories.

Shortly before our oldest, Gunner, was born she started showing signs of dementia... an awful disease that steals a persons mind far before their body fails them. She continued to sew and some days were good days. Other days found her talking to imaginary people who had stole her tv remote. 

At my baby shower, we knew the baby was a boy. So everything was either camo or blue. Until I opened my Grandma Shorty's gift. I expected a quilt, but what I didn't expect was a pink quilt and two pink receiving blankets. When I opened them, you could hear everyone whisper...isn't she having a boy? My mom did a great job of nicely whispering to people that Grandma had dementia and may or may not have remembered we told her it was a boy. I thanked my grandma though and stored the quilt in our basement.

Move forward to now. My mom and I were trying to figure out what family heirloom I could incorporate into Mae's newborn photos. With my family's history of quilt making, I wanted a special quilt, not just one picked up at a garage sale. I wanted one with a story.

Then my mom reminded me of the quilt my Grandma Shorty had given me.....eight years earlier... maybe she knew there'd be more to the story.